Trudeau’s foreign policy is fine, but tweeting it was dumb

In theory, there is nothing wrong and a good deal to be said for adopting a “progressive” foreign and trade policy. Clearly, very many Canadians believe it reflects their values and support it. But it needs to be closely defined, and it needs to be subtle and thoughtful in its application.

Cartoon by Rainer Hachfeld, Neues Deutschland, Germany

Even before Prince Mohammed bin Salman threw his pyrotechnic hissy fit, the Trudeau government’s dedication to its “progressive” foreign and trade policy was already problematic.

A lot of people don’t appreciate having their private lives examined, poked and prodded by foreigners who then berate them in public and counsel them on how to become better, more moral members of society. At best, it can be intensely irritating. At worst, it is counter-productive. And so it has proved with Saudi Arabia’s ruler, Prince Mohammed.

There are countless speculations about why the prince has responded with such consumate and theatrical outrage to Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland’s Tweet calling for the release of imprisoned human and women’s rights activists in Saudi Arabia. He’s an irascible character, whose authority is besieged on many fronts, largely because of his hubris and contempt for opposition. So maybe Freeland just caught him on a bad day, but the price Canada is going to pay both from its economy and its diplomatic status is going to be significant.

It’s all very well to say, as many are, that being attacked by the leader of a medieval, autocratic theocracy like Prince Mohammed is an affirmation of Canadian values and should be worn as a badge of honour. There’s truth to that, but as with so much in life, context is everything.

It is notable that none of Canada’s allies or countries that are traditional friends in the Middle East has rushed to support Ottawa. Part of the rationale is undoubtedly that Saudi Arabia, for all its eccentricity at the top, remains one of the three or four key and most influential players in the Middle East. If you are going to antagonize Riyadh you’d better do it for a good reason and with a clear outcome in mind.

But perhaps more damaging to Canada’s reputation was Freeland’s adopting of the tweet as a means of communicating foreign policy. She and the department might have got away with it if the tweet was just a general expression of Canadian abhorrence at the locking up of human rights advocates, but this was a direct comment on Saudi Arabian domestic politics and it was re-Tweeted in Arabic too.

The world is experiencing the terrors of foreign and domestic politics conducted in a torrent of mindless 280 characters from the White House. Global Affairs Canada did itself no credit and appears to have harmed its reputation by seeming to adopt this fashion for Twitter diplomacy.

In theory, there is nothing wrong and a good deal to be said for adopting a “progressive” foreign and trade policy. Clearly, very many Canadians believe it reflects their values and support it. But it needs to be closely defined, and it needs to be subtle and thoughtful in its application. Before last Friday’s message was sent out, no one seems to have ordered a halt and asked: Is this the best way to achieve our objectives with Saudi Arabia?

Likewise with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s whirlwind visit to Beijing early in December, aimed at kick-starting negotiations for a free trade agreement with China. The whole episode became a fiasco when the Chinese balked at Ottawa’s demand that the pact include requirements that China adopt Canadian “progressive” labour, environmental, and women’s equality policies. Anyone in Ottawa or the Canadian embassy in Beijing who imagined that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) would contemplate for one moment allowing a foreign government to write a script for Chinese social reform was either dreaming in Technicolor, or grossly incompetent, or both.

Now, there’s a strong body of opinion, which I for one follow, which says that the collapse of free trade talks with China was the best outcome for Canada. A free trade agreement would make Canada only a greater victim of the CCP’s economic imperialism than it already is. What Canada needs with China is fewer non-tariff barriers for Canadian goods and services at their end, and more barriers and transparency on Chinese investment at ours.

Even so, the Beijing fiasco ought to have spurred a re-examination of what a “progressive” diplomatic and trade policy means and how it is applied. As Bank of Canada researcher Carmen Avila-Yiptong pointed out in an article for the Canadian International Council in March, the substance of the progressive trade agenda is hard to find behind buzzwords like “sustainable” and “inclusive.”

Position papers issued by Global Affairs Canada outline what Avila-Yiptong politely calls a “holistic” approach to foreign and trade policy. As well as aiming for trade and diplomatic relations that enhance economic growth, financial opportunity, technological and environmental innovation, and red-tape reduction, the policy also wants to include issues regarding labour, the environment, gender equality, transparency and inclusive economic growth.

Thus it is a melange of practical economic and aspirational social objectives.

As the experiences with China and Saudi Arabia show, the two are not always compatible. At least they are seldom compatible when paraded hand-in-hand.

In trying to persuade diplomatic partner countries to change and improve their human rights records, there’s a lot to be said for countries like Canada to do it quietly and privately while non-governmental human rights organizations make the public case.

It is slow and tedious work, and a lot less appealing to the public back home than some flamboyant piece of theatre. But when dealing with absolute monarchs, autocrats, military regimes and suchlike, finding ways to foster engagement is usually more productive that sparking a defensive reaction that will be very difficult to reverse, such as that from Prince Mohammed.

Traditionally, quiet, thoughtful and imaginative engagement has been a strength of Canadian diplomacy. It has developed a substantial infrastructure outside government, such as the use of so-called Track II networks of academics, retired officials and business people to forge ties and further understanding.

There is also a solid record of Canada facilitating relations between Canadian and foreign NGOs to the same end.

These are matters that need to be constantly re-assessed and re-addressed because the idea of “progressive” foreign and trade policies are embedded in the DNA of Canada’s foreign ministry.

Those bloodlines have grown out of the Student Christian Movement, which was very popular in Canadian universities in the first decades of the 20th century. The movement interpreted the New Testament as a “social gospel” demanding missionary zeal to improve people’s lives and living conditions.

A critical year was 1931. That was when the British parliament passed the Statute of Westminster, which gave the “White Dominions” – Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa – full control over their foreign policies. In response, Oskar D. Skelton, the deputy minister of foreign affairs, who was the former Dean of Arts and Science at Queens University, began assembling the department and the first cast of characters who would design and fashion Canadian foreign policy.

As he built the department, Skelton turned naturally to people from the Student Christian Movement who shared his religious and social ethics. He recruited men like future Liberal Prime Minister and one of the architects of the United Nations, Lester B. Pearson; Canada’s first native-born Governor General, Vincent Massey; and Hume Wrong, who was Canadian ambassador to Washington in the 1940s and 1950s, and who became one of the stonemasons of the post-Second World War global order that is now under threat.

Trudeau’s “progressive” trade and foreign policies are direct descendants of the “social gospel” of the Student Christian Movement. But historically, they have had as many failures as successes, and they only work when applied with subtlety and imagination. Tweets don’t do it.

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The views, opinions and positions expressed by all iPolitics columnists and contributors are the author’s alone. They do not inherently or expressly reflect the views, opinions and/or positions of iPolitics.

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8 comments on “Trudeau’s foreign policy is fine, but tweeting it was dumb”

Since Trudeau wants to call out countries on their dismal human rights records, then why hasn’t he in the same format address Iran’s human rights records on its people?
Simple, Justin has closer ties with Iran as his brother works for that gov than he has with the Saudis.

Chuck, we need some real intellect to grab our attention, in your posts! Not just snide, snarky ridicule of everyone you deign to post a reply to or about! And there have been many!
Use of riducule is a small man’s ego booster, so by that definition, you must be very…very small!

Jesus.. seriously Manthorpe? The PM stands up to Saudi human rights abusers, and all you’re blathering about is how we didn’t tell the whip-holding torturers that they’re whip-holding torturers in a nice enough way.

A lot of the complaints from the old school diplomats and journalists about Twitter are pure nostalgia.
Today if an innocent civil rights activist is jailed for no reason by an autocratic government it possible to issue a complaint within hours.
Nostalgia for the days when a response through channels etc might take months is just out of touch with the real world.
Too bad Conservatives used this excuse to go all wobbly.

I’m sure that Manthorpe’s pipe dream about us lowering tariffs on the Chinese side while increasing barriers in the name of transparency on ours is SO practical and pragmatic. The Chinese would never accede to that without grievously huge head wounds. So please, do tell us what we ‘China acolytes’ will try to sway the public about. Common sense says that these dogs won’t hunt.

In my opinion the writer Jonathan Manthorpe is out of touch with Canadians and the Canadian culture. Jonathan has spent too much time on a foreign desk to have a balanced knowledge or quite frankly the ability to appreciate and journalize this event. Please stick to mudslides and ferry sinkings.

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Author

Jonathan Manthorpe is the author of “Forbidden Nation: A History of Taiwan,” published by Palgrave-Macmillan. He has been a foreign correspondent and international affairs columnist for nearly 40 years. He was European bureau chief for the Toronto Star and then Southam News in the late 1970s and the 1980s. In 1989 he was appointed Africa correspondent by Southam News and in 1993 was posted to Hong Kong to cover Asia. For the last few years he has been based in Vancouver, writing international affairs columns for what is now the Postmedia Group. He left the group last year and now writes for a range of newspapers and websites. [email protected]